This is a good article identifying the key weakness in the Tory armoury. Even as a Blue Collar Tory (well ex-Tory) I do not have a problem with the government being run by Old Etonians, after all they do have the best education that money can buy and always run the country one way or another anyway. I actually think it is a good thing to have the brightest people in top positions but every successful government needs good balance with the people it represents included. The Conservative Party used to be the party of Middle England, so it is perhaps strange to see so few voices of Middle England represented. This blog in the Telegraph highlights a major gap in the ranks – the absence of a Tebbit or Parkinson to communicate the Tory story. This is the gap that Nigel Farage from UKIP fills very well. He speaks the language of Middle England. Leaving aside the big question on the Tory party’s content for messages, there is another major challenge in style, presentation, communication – and voice. Maybe this is why many Conservatives look at UKIP, listen to Mr Farage and see a party they recognise – it’s the old Conservative Party – and they see themselves.
Without intending to name drop, I had the pleasure to chat with the PM last week, he was very amicable, extremely personable, good at working an audience (of many and indeed one) and is alarmingly fresh, bright, and frightening young looking up close, but he is not the sort of person that Middle England really likes or trusts. He doesn’t come over as being particular detached from the ordinary world and looks and speaks like many a Middle England young Dad. But he isn’t that person. He is a professional politician who has only previously worked in PR, so cannot claim to have had a proper job, and is clearly a shining, if not shiny, beacon and standard holder of the ghastly metropolitan elite chattering classes. Middle England (which incidentally – determines the outcome of general elections) quite likes shambolic Toffs like Boris, unorthodox ones like Winston Churchill, even outrageous ones like the late Alan Clark, but who they really warm to are the straight-talking, no-nonsense, self-made men like Parkinson, Tebbit and indeed Farage.
Arguably this is an issue for poor old Ed Miliband as well. I watched a toe-curling news report on TV the other evening showing Ed touring a home for the elderly, demonstrating in every awkward move and nasal breath his total inability to communicate with “the common man”. Ed is not “posh” as such having been educated by his Marxist father at the local Comp. but he does hail from the lofty heights of North London academia. He is at heart a policy wonk and not really of this planet. even more sadly for Ed M is the fact that his best attempt to get more gritty would be Ed B., who is just plain offensive. It is difficult to identify anyone on the left bank that fits the bill of good communicator since the superb Alan Johnson. or indeed the Revd. Tony. Ironically of course Tony was a real Toff and now seems to have gone back to his roots, but like him or loath him, Middle England definitely connected with him. They of course recognised him as a fellow Tory.
Lady Thatcher once said “every PM needs a Willy” (another liked Toff for whom ordinary people had a lot of affection), but maybe David needs a Norman (or Nigel). Once David Davis aspired to be that person and attracted support from those of us who support the Thatcherite dictat of meritocracy, but frankly he blew it and sadly is taken seriously by few, particularly those who still blame him for lumbering the party with Lord Snooty and his Pals.
The dangerous move for Mr Cameron, taken even before he was elected leader of the party and engineered by the about to return Steve Hilton, was to “decontaminate the brand” from the “nasty party” of Theresa May infamy, by distancing himself from the very people who are the Conservative Party. Many will ask, who does the “new” Conservative Party appeal to? It’s like Coca Cola when it dumped the recipe for “New Coke” and soon had to go crawling back to it’s heritage by reinventing the Classic Coke brand. Not that politics should be compared to soft drink marketing, but it is a convenient reference point. Most Conservatives may be found to like the classic taste better, and see that represented not by Mr Cameron, but by Mr Farage?
